The (Sex) Toy Story

Ruminations from a middle-aged man who thought the sexual revolution was over, somebody lost, and things were pretty much the same.

I bought my first dildo. A vibrating dildo. No big deal. People buy them all the time. Yeah. Other people. Not me people.

I’m a respectable, ex-lawyer (hence my respectability.) I have two pretty and pretty-grown daughters. Sure, I’ve bought Playboy. Back in the ’80s. And stumbled across online porn. And stumbled upon it again. Maybe again. But what I do in the faux privacy of my own internet address is my business.

While it is perfectly possible, nay, practical, to purchase plastic pricks from a staggering variety of vendors via laptop, when you haven’t the faintest idea of what you are looking at, that old “kick the tires” conditioning takes over. You gotta see it to believe it.

Back in the day, when people read and guys were adept at holding a magazine with one hand, we had things called adult bookstores. They were usually small, block concrete joints, windowless, sitting forlorn with a dirt parking lot way, way out of town. You had to know somebody to find them, because seldom were they in the Yellow Pages.

Directions usually ran like this: “Take Route 23 out to where you see the big cow sign, make a right, and go about two miles until you come to a dead deer lying just off the side of the road on your left. Drive another mile and look for a mailbox with the fading name “Jabilinski” on it. Make a left, look for a pre-Revolutionary War tombstone lying on its side. Make a hard right. Go down that road, such as it is, about half a mile and you’ll see a little shack …”

You had to be really, really horny.

It’s different today. Folks frequenting a sex shop must be in a clear line of sight to one million motorists crawling by with nothing better to do but gawk at “perverts” slouching in and out of the joint. Maybe it’s an ordinance. Certainly the act of pubic privacy starts in a very public way.

So pervert me pulls onto the lot, noting the spaces closest to the door are all taken. It’s a good 50 yards. Do I skulk or walk head high, confident, like I’ve done this a hundred times before, proud of my uninhibited sexuality?

Nah. I try to look like I’m doing this for a friend, whatever the hell that look is supposed to look like. I mean, I am in a way. It’s not really mine. Not my fault she wants a vibrator. Not my fault I can’t bring this woman to orgasm in any timely fashion. Before my tongue has swollen to the point I sound like a club boxer.

The place is 2,000 square feet, with multiple aisles and walls covered with toys, at least half being dildos. Jesus, how big is the sex toy market anyway?*

Two sweet-looking young ladies are managing the store. I’m sure they would’ve been helpful if I’d the guts to ask, which I didn’t. After wandering around trying not to touch too much, I got the
“Can I help you sir?”

Of course you can, and no double entendre. I have no idea what I’m really looking for, outside of it being not as long as me and wide as me but capable of vibrating better than me the morning after a night of Margaritas.

“No thank you,” I murmur, acting like I’d already systematically, scientifically narrowed the choices down. I pick up a barbershop-striped vibrator: $14.99. Even in sex shops, they exercise price psychology.

I hand it to the woman behind the sales desk. She couldn’t have been more than 25, and she was wearing rubber gloves. “Let’s make sure it works,” she says, and rips it off the card.

I was going to protest, but of course this made sense. Imagine the disappointment and me sounding like Rocky again for another couple days. She puts two double AA’s in it, screws the end back on, and hits the switch. A kind of whiney, bee-like buzz is emitted. She holds it in her hands for about 10 seconds.

“Nice.”

Oh, God.

“Thanks,” I say.

“You want me to wrap it?”

“No, not necessary.” What, I was going to use it in the car on the way home?

She bags it, a dark plastic Shop-Rite type, no logo-thank-you-Lord, I pay in cash, and casually make my way to the door, feigning some interest in the hip-to-knee rubber female torso in one of the cases. My mind, fortunately, is blank.

I practically sprint to the car, and of course traffic is at a virtual standstill. I swear people are sitting atop their vehicles with video cameras. Mental note to my sweating self: Don’t buy these during rush hour.

Footnote: The salesgirl removed the batteries. Guess what I did and didn’t have that night? Right on both accounts.

(*According to Inc. Magazine, excluding porn, about two of those billions in the U.S. alone.)